Massive World Bank Comprimise

The details are fairly chilling and include some amazingly upbeat quotes like…

“While it remains unclear how much data has been pilfered from the bank, it’s a lot. According to internal memos, “a minimum of 18 servers have been compromised,” including some of the bank’s most sensitive systems — ranging from the bank’s security and password server to a Human Resources server “that contains scanned images of staff documents.””

And…

“The World Bank Group’s computer network — one of the largest repositories of sensitive data about the economies of every nation — has been raided repeatedly by outsiders for more than a year, FOX News has learned.”

This is certainly disturbing news for a number of reasons. Most importantly the fact that the worlds financial system is serious peril and this…

In a frantic midnight e-mail to colleagues, the bank’s senior technology manager referred to the situation as an “unprecedented crisis.” In fact, it may be the worst security breach ever at a global financial institution. And it has left bank officials scrambling to try to understand the nature of the year-long cyber-assault, while also trying to keep the news from leaking to the public.

The italicised text is what I find very disturbing. GLB, SOX and a slew of other laws all have strict disclosure guidelines. Trying to hide something of this magnitude is not only futile but also illegal.

Not a surprise with a news source as “Fair & Balanced” and as good at fact checking as FoxNews is… but…

UPDATE: After FOX News published its story, a World Bank spokesman issued the following statement:

“The Fox News story is wrong and is riddled with falsehoods and errors. The story cites misinformation from unattributed sources and leaked emails that are taken out of context.

“Like other public and private institutions, the World Bank has repeatedly experienced hacking attacks on its computer systems and is constantly updating its security to defeat these. But at no point has a hacking attack accessed sensitive information in the World Bank’s Treasury, procurement, anti-corruption or human resources departments.”